Australia has been regarded for the last 80 years as a member of the elite club of truly industrialised and modern nations. The fact of Australia’s industrialisation is regarded by most people, particularly scholars, as an inevitable consequence of being part of the industrial and technological culture of north-western Europe. But there was never anything inevitable about the industrialisation of Australia. Australia was a battle ground for competing major economic powers including Britain, the United States, France, Germany and later Japan. In 1900, Australia was a valuable market for manufactured goods. While the struggle for this market was at times intense, there was de facto agreement among the major powers that the emergence of local secondary industry was not to be encouraged.